Feb 20 Monday Night PlayGround Topic

Care (/ker/): N. The provision of what is necessary for the health, welfare, maintenance, and protection of someone or something; Serious attention or consideration applied to doing something correctly or to avoid damage or risk. V. Feel concern or interest; attach importance to something; Look after and provide for the needs of. – Oxford Dictionary.

“Never believe that a few caring people can’t change the world. For, indeed, that’s all who ever have.” -Margaret Mead

PlayGround is excited to announce the topic for our first Monday Night PlayGround “Social Justice Night”, this year focused on “Care”! As the debate heats up around the possible repeal of the Affordable Care Act and societal divisions seem ever more pronounced, PlayGround writers explore the broader subject of “Care” in the context of social justice. PlayGround playwrights had four-and-a-half days to generate original short plays inspired by the topic and the top six short works will be presented as script-in-hand staged readings on Monday, February 20 at Berkeley Rep. For tickets and discount flex passes, visit http://playground-sf.org/monday.

Each month, PlayGround announces a topic to the thirty-six playwrights in the PlayGround Writers Pool and the writers have four-and-a-half days to generate original ten-minute scripts inspired by the topic. Recent topics have included: “We Hold These Truths to be Self-Evident,” “Going Viral,” and “Awakening to the Dream of the Earth” as part of a now-three-year collaboration with Planet Earth Arts and Stanford University. The top six plays from each month are rehearsed for just one-and-a-half hours each and presented as script-in-hand staged readings at Monday Night PlayGround, now celebrating its twenty-third year. PlayGround audiences get to enjoy a unique behind-the-scenes perspective, with a free Pre-Performance Discussion at 7:10pm.  Audience members can also experience the thrill of being a producer through the monthly People’s Choice Awards, helping to determine which plays and playwrights go on for consideration in PlayGround’s annual showcase, the Best of PlayGround Festival.

PlayGround, the Bay Area’s leading playwright incubator, provides unique development opportunities for the Bay Area’s best new playwrights, including the monthly Monday Night PlayGround staged reading series, annual PlayGround Festival of New Works, full-length play commissions and support for the production of new plays by local playwrights through the New Play Production Fund. To date, PlayGround has supported over 200 local playwrights in the development and staging of more than 800 original short plays and 71 new full-length plays, with 8 more commissions currently in development. PlayGround also operates Potrero Stage (formerly Thick House), a black box theatre in San Francisco’s Potrero Hill neighborhood, recently renovated and re-opened earlier this month. For more information, visit http://playground-sf.org.

WHAT:  Occurring monthly, September-March, the popular Monday Night PlayGround series presents staged readings of thematically-connected short works by the Bay Area’s best new playwrights each month at Berkeley Repertory Theatre, staged by leading local professional actors and directors.  The given topic for the February 20 PlayGround Social Justice Night is “Care”.

WHERE: Berkeley Repertory Theatre, 2025 Addison St, Berkeley, CA

WHEN: Monday, February 20, 2017 at 8pm

Additional Season Dates:

March 20, 2017 – WomenArts Night

TICKETS: Tickets are $15 general admission ($30, priority seating) online in advance and $20 general admission at the door, subject to availability. 5-admission flex passes are just $75 and include priority seating.  For more information about the Monday Night PlayGround series, call (415) 992-6677 or visit www.PlayGround-sf.org/monday.